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Sunday, 29 May 2011

Stellar Assault (32X)

Or Shadow Squadron if you're in the US.

No textured polygons this time. Looks almost like SNES Super FX graphics.

Star Fox (SNES)

That ship must have like 5 times the polygons of an Ar-Wing though.

This is a really dramatic sounding menu. Every time I move between options it plays an drum sound. The polygons may be untextured, but that makes them show up clear and bright. Also it means you can change the colour of the enemy ships, which is an awesomely pointless option.

It's awesome enough that the ships have colour, grey spaceships make for very monotone visuals.

Are we being launched to space from a planet here? I don't know why else the track would tilt up but I can't see anything but black and stars out there.

This definitely isn't a Star Fox style corridor of destruction shooter, I can fly wherever I want. This definitely isn't Star Fox music either though, because it's pretty bad.

Mercifully it's pretty easy to track and destroy these fighters, not like in DarXide. The guns aim exactly where you want them to.

And then I can fire off these little pink torpedoes. Which eat up my red ammo meter.

I love these things! I carve up capital ships section by section, blowing off engines and wings to cripple them, which is pretty satisfying. It's nice to see my attacks leave some visible damage even if the thing isn't quite dead yet.

Mission complete! I guess we're docking with this thing then?

Rearm and repair! Excellent.

Mission two: Blow everything up. I will carry out that objective with extreme enthusiasm.

Hey, what's that thing? Some kind of jumpgate? I like how there's actually a bit of draw distance to this. Capital ships, and whatever that ring is, provide landmarks so I can figure out where I am and see where I'm going.

I'm not a fan of that radar though, I'd be much happier if they'd given me two, one for forward, and one showing what's behind me.

I dive right in, picking on the biggest, closest ship in the area, firing off both flavours of energy bolts. The controls in this are actually pretty good, the ship is steered with the d-pad and I can roll with the buttons. Seems like common sense, but I've played games that have screwed that up before.

I guess this thing would be my primary objective though. I'd better blow it up before I run out of ammo.

This thing is made up of so many damn sections, I'll be here forever trying to wreck it. Especially as I'm almost out of ammo. Screw it, I'll take on the capital ships instead.

Ooops I ran out of shield too.

It's not the most exciting game in the world, though half the blame for that is probably the music. But it definitely seems like the most solid 3d space shooter on the 32X so far. Out of the two I've played.

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The Rules

1. I must not use cheats, save states, trainers, hacking devices etc. to progress through the game. I play the game as it is and if I can't get any further then I quit. (Or run off to check a walkthrough.)

2. I must not read the manual before playing or play fan translations. I like to figure things out for myself and it's more amusing if I don't know what I'm doing.

3. I must not complete the games. I'm trying to take a quick look at interesting games, retro classics and obscure crap, show what they're like and show off the art, not make full 'Let's Play' playthroughs or reviews.

4. You must not read these posts if you're concerned about -- spoilers --.I may discuss the story and show screenshots of cutscenes and dialogue. But I try to make sure I'm only spoiling the game that I'm playing.